Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 7.djvu/283

 had happened: Some minutes after Fix left the smoking-house two waiters raised Passepartout, who was in a deep sleep, and laid him on the bed reserved for the smokers. But, three hours later, Passepartout, pursued even in his bad dreams by a fixed idea, woke again and struggled against the stupefying action of the narcotic. The thought of unaccomplished duty shook off his torpor. He left this drunkard's bed, reeling, supporting himself by the wall, falling and rising, but always and irresistibly urged on by a sort of instinct. He finally went out of the smoking-house, crying in a dream, "The Carnatic! the Carnatic!"

The steamer was there, steam up, ready to leave. Passepartout had only a few steps to go. He rushed upon the plank, crossed it, and fell unconscious on the forward deck at the very moment that the Carnatic was slipping her moorings.

Some of the sailors, as men accustomed to this kind of scenes, took the poor fellow down into a second cabin, and Passepartout only waked the next morning, one hundred and fifty miles from the Chinese coast.

This is then why Passepartout found himself this morning on the Carnatic's deck, taking full draughts of the fresh sea breezes. The pure air sobered him. He commenced to collect his ideas, but he did not succeed without difficulty. But, finally, he recalled the scenes of the day before, the confidences of Fix, the smoking-house, etc.

"It is evident," he said to himself, "that I have been abominably drunk! What will Mr. Fogg say? In any event I have not missed the steamer, and this is the principal thing."

Then, thinking of Fix, he said to himself: "As for him, I hope we are now rid of him, and that he has not dared, after what he proposed to me, to follow us on the Carnatic. A police detective on my master's heels, accused of the robbery committed upon the Bank of England! Pshaw! Mr. Fogg is as much a robber as I am a murderer!"

Ought Passepartout to tell these things to his master? Would it be proper to inform him of the part played by Fix in this affair? Would it not be better to wait until his return to London, to tell him that an agent of the Metropolitan Police had followed him, and then have a laugh with him? Yes, doubtless. In any event, it was a matter to be looked